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Tag: Poverty

The purchasing-power rates (PPPs) from the 2011 International Comparison Program (ICP) suggest lower inequality and poverty in the world than was thought based on prior ICP data. However, there are some continuing and (as yet) poorly resolved concerns about the data revisions implied by the 2011 ICP.

You may find the answer surprising, but the most recent data show that the world as a whole is becoming more equal, driven by fast growth rates of China and India and slower growth rates in rich countries. A decrease in the US mean income from 2008 to 2011, for instance, makes global convergence of people’s incomes a lot easier to achieve.

I’m pleased to be on this list of “top economist” signatories of an open letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon endorsing the simple idea that economic growth should be the foundation stone on which the other Sustainable Development Goals, especially poverty reduction, are built.

In a recent SNL sketch Bill Haider is a white celebrity filming a commercial in a village using black people as props to plead for “39 cents a day” which he claims is “all these people need to survive.”

Last week saw the release of the new 2011 Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) rates for GDP produced by the International Comparison Program (ICP). The ICP is a major global statistical operation. The Global Office is housed in the World Bank but the ICP is implemented separately in each region by designated regional counterparts.

While I was plowing through Morten Jerven’s enlightening book Poor Numbers last year, my mind concentrated on Nigeria. It stayed with Nigeria. At that time, I was consumed with figuring out what on earth was going on with Nigeria’s poverty figures. How was it possible for the country to experience growth in both its GDP and extreme poverty rates at the same time?